Jeremy Duffy - Awareness Advocate » Gaming

China Bans Gold Farming

Jeremy — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 11:50:16 +0000

While playing online games like World of Warcraft and similar, you find advertisements for people who will get you rare items or in-game money (gold) for a fee. These so-called "gold-farmers" are often employed in different countries like China.

Well, China took note and passed a ban on gold farming based on the idea that the economy of large online games could affect the real economy negatively.

Whatever the reason, I think that getting rid of the farmers will have a positive effect on the games themselves and I hope we see more of this in the future.

DRM Shuts Down “Gears of War” Players

Jeremy — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 14:29:43 +0000

DRM is sofware that lets the vendor control where and how you use a piece of software you bought and is both offensive and pointless in my opinion. That said, here's yet more evidence of how DRM causes problems for people who aren't doing anything wrong.

(H/T to Slashdot for the link)

Using Laptop Parts to Make Low Heat Power Gaming Machine

Jeremy — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 18:31:13 +0000

This is clever. HP used a variety of laptop parts to make a cool and silent, but powerful gaming desktop.

“Spore” Dying Under DRM

Jeremy — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 12:03:31 +0000

Spore, the long-awaited (years actually) video game from the creator of Sim-City and the Sims has finally been released, but with a catch. It includes invasive drm that has resulted in a movement by gamers to keep the Amazon.com score at the absolute bottom.

I hate to see a good game go down, but I'm posting this in the hopes that it helps spread the message and damages their sales just that much more. No company has the right to try so hard to control how we use software that we can't use the software.

Second Life Market About to Crash?

Jeremy — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 12:28:52 +0000

It seems that the Second Life client can be made to connect to open servers run by anyone. If that's the case, then what will maintain the Second Life market structure? A lot of their income came from land (which you had to pay a monthly fee to own), but if you can now go to an open server for your land where there's no charge (or run your own), what will Linden do?

Even worse, if the only thing keeping people from copying items is a terms of service agreement, what's to stop someone from doing it on a completely open server? This is also great news for those involved in virtual sexual deviance ("age-play" for example) who will now be able to do what they wish without interference.

Massive Multi-player Online Gaming for Kids – Beware

Jeremy — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 12:12:58 +0000

There are already plenty of cases of adults or college students who have lost jobs and dropped out of school due to MMO gaming obsessions. Now we're going to unleash this on our kids?

If you're thinking of letting you kid play an MMO, be very careful about what game you choose and be sure to set limits on how and when they play.

New Video Game Forces Adware Functionality to Play

Jeremy — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 11:13:57 +0000

Hellgate, a soon-to-be-released video game includes a license agreement that forces players to accept the harvesting of identifying information from their machine. This is part of an in-game advertising scheme that, so far, doesn't quite reach the level of what the Penny Arcade cartoonists prophesied, but it's getting closer.

(H/T to Slashdot for the link)

Casual Gaming Big Business and Getting Bigger

Jeremy — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 11:24:20 +0000

I was glad to see this Ars Technica article about how casual gaming is a huge thing especially in the arena of casual MMOs. This is what I've been saying all along with my City of Heroes webpage.

A Blurb About Manhunt 2

Jeremy — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 11:54:22 +0000

I don't know a lot about this game other than it's very violent and has been banned from the UK. Reading about it doesn't make it any better:

“In Manhunt 2, players can mutilate their enemies with an axe; saw their skulls in half castrate them with a pair of pliers; or kill them by bashing their head into an electrical box, where a power surges eventually blows their head apart, ? the letter charges. “On the Nintendo Wii, players will actually act out the violence. One review of the game describes using a saw blade to "cut upward into a foe's groin and buttocks, motioning forward and backward with the Wii remote as you go. ?

Wow, you couldn't make it more real if you tried. Parental groups in the US aren't necessarily determined to ban it and would be satisfied with just giving it an Adult rating. While this is a completely reasonable request and, as far as I'm concerned, a blatantly obvious decision, Take-Two (the game's producer) is fighting this for purely monetary reasons:

An Adults Only rating, however, could be a death blow to the game, since Nintendo and Sony, maker of the PlayStation platform, currently have policies that bar AO-rated games for their systems. That would limit sales for use only on personal computers.

On MMO Gaming Addiction

Jeremy — Fri, 15 Jun 2007 16:51:22 +0000

You've probably heard that online gaming can be addictive and destructive. Click the link to read about one person's eventual exodus from the gaming reality he spent years creating.